Page 93 of What Happens at Nightfall

“Will any of it actually work?” Jess remembered that bowl in Ingrid’s apartment, with dried herbs at the bottom. “I hate to say this, but anything we can find or think of—won’t Ingrid have found or thought of it already? She’s been working on this for two years. And she had access to Renaissance texts we don’t.”

Adam’s eyes were drifting closed. “She was trying to cast it into things, not expel it.”

“Maybe there was a reason for that.” Jess pulled her legs up under her. “Maybe we’re barking up the wrong tree.”

“Mmm, trees,” said Adam dreamily. He was sliding slowly down the slippery leather of her IKEA couch, his long legs stretched out underneath her coffee table.

“Hey. Wake up.” Jess waved her hand in front of his face. “Don’t think about trees. Think about Cornelia Vanderwilt. She contained it rather than expelling it. Maybe you can’t expel it.”

“Or maybe she was just saving it for later, like sticking an ice pop in the freezer.” Reluctantly, Adam pulled himself up so he was sitting up straight. “On the other hand, she did actually manage to contain it. So that was a win. At this point, I’d settle for casting it into glass or stone or a Funko Pop! figurine, just so long as it was out of my head.”

“And out of my bed,” added Jess.

“Particularly out of your bed,” said Adam, giving her a heavy-lidded look. Then he ruined it with another epic yawn.

Jess stood. “You should go home. You look beat.”

“I’m not beat, but I am tired.” Standing, Adam twined his fingers through hers. “We’ll beat this thing. Somehow.”

He leaned forward and kissed her, slowly and deliberately.

If he was hearing voices, he didn’t tell her, but Jess had the feeling his attention wasn’t entirely on her.

“I’ll ask Kimmy,” she said resolutely. “Maybe there was something in the Vanderwilt papers that would give us some sort of clue as to how Cornelia did it.”

Adam touched a finger gently to her cheek. “Maybe it wasn’t Cornelia. Maybe it was Jacinta. Jess, when we were at Ingrid’s—there was light coming out of your hands.”

“It must have been light coming through the window.” Jess’s throat closed up. That idea of his—that idea that she had some sort of hereditary power. But what if she didn’t? “I’m about as magical as a wet noodle.”

“I think you’re pretty magical,” Adam said.

“Tell me that again when the Prohibition Punch wears off,” Jess said. “Do you have everything?”

Adam’s blazer was crumpled on the floor between the living room and her bedroom. It was such a cliché, thought Jess. The trail of clothes. They just needed to be in bed each smoking a cigarette with the sheet around their chests, except that neither of them smoked, and they hadn’t actually had sex.

“Do you want me to call you an Uber?” Jess asked, handing Adam his blazer.

“I think I can handle it.” Adam stood there with his blazer over his arm, fidgeting with one of the gold buttons. “We have this thing next Thursday night at Green-Wood. Nightfall. It’s a performance art thing. Musicians, dancers, films . . . We open up some of the mausoleums.”

“Do you think there’ll be trouble?” If she were a demon, that would be a pretty good place to cause chaos. Like the Brooklyn Theater Fire.

“Um, no. I hadn’t thought of that. What I was trying to say was . . . Would you have any interest in going? I was going to try to sneak the kids in, but it turns out they’re pretty strict about guests being over twenty-one.”

If he kept tugging at that button, it was going to fall off. “So what you’re saying is that you want me as your backup date.”

“I want you as my date,” he said. “If you’re willing to risk it, that is. The last time you were at Green-Wood, something threw an urn at you.”

“You sure know how to make an invitation appealing.”

“If you’d rather not . . .”

He was offering her an out. She could take it—or take some risks for once. “If we’ve learned anything, it’s that the threat isn’t confined to the bounds of Green-Wood. It’s everywhere. It’s under my pillow. It’s probably in the refrigerator. Sure. Sure, I’ll come with you. Now go home and get some sleep before you fall asleep on the floor.”

“We’ve got a week,” said Adam hopefully, as Jess opened the door for him. “Almost a week. Maybe we’ll come up with something by then.”

“If Cornelia Vanderwilt did it, so can we,” said Jess. “I’ll call Kimmy in the morning.”

Kimmy, it turned out, was busy in the morning. And in the afternoon. And all the next day. It was preschool birthday party season and her weekend was booked solid. But she had a doctor’s appointment in Jess’s neighborhood on Thursday and could come over after.